The far west of Mongolia belongs to a different world from the grasslands near Ulaanbaatar. Bayan-Ölgii province lies in the Altai Mountains, close to the borders of Russia, China and Kazakhstan, and most of its people are ethnic Kazakhs who arrived in the nineteenth century and still keep eagles for hunting. In winter, riders on horseback go out with golden eagles on their arms to hunt foxes, a tradition that survives here more strongly than anywhere else. The air is dry and thin, and the sky seems enormous.
The sites of Tsagaan Salaa and Baga Oigor are part of the Petroglyphic Complexes of the Mongolian Altai, which UNESCO inscribed in 2011. They lie along the valley of the Tsagaan Salaa River, where thousands of images have been pecked into the dark rock. The earliest are some twelve thousand years old, depicting hunters and animals such as ibex, deer and aurochs, and later layers add chariots, bronze age burial mounds and Turkic stone figures from the first millennium. Walking among them, with the wind in the grass and a few yaks nearby, you can read the long human story of the mountains.
For riders this is true expedition terrain. The tracks that lead into the valleys are rough and unmarked, crossing rivers and open steppe, with loose gravel and soft sand, and the weather can change in an hour. Snow can fall at any time of year at this altitude, and the best months are July and August, when the days are warm and the nights cold. There are no signs and navigation relies on a GPS and local knowledge. A guide who knows the tracks and the river crossings is not a luxury here but a safety measure.
Ölgii, the provincial capital, is the last place with proper fuel stations, shops and a bazaar, and it makes sense to fill tanks and carry spare fuel before going into the mountains. Nomad families welcome travelers into their gers with salty milk tea, dried curds and sometimes boiled mutton, and a polite visitor accepts what is offered.
The land is huge and the stillness is real. At dusk the light goes gold on the hills, and the only sounds are the river and the occasional call of a herder.